Amazon Studios has just announced the development of an Amazon TV adaptation for the Criminal comic book series, written by Ed Brubaker and illustrated by Sean Phillips. The six-part series, which first began printing in 2006, has sold millions of copies internationally, and a writers’ room has been reportedly set up for a TV series based on the comics.
The Criminal comic book series, created and owned by Ed Brubaker, consists of six titles: Criminal, Incognito, Fatale, The Fade Out, and Kill or be Killed. Each issue features a collection of characters with their own separate arcs who would be entirely disconnected from one another if not for the fact that they all live in Center City, all frequent the same bar, and all have two generations of crime to live up to.
Everything We Know About ‘Criminal’ Comic Series on Amazon
In a 2019 interview, Criminal Writer told Deadline the following about Criminal comics:
“Criminal tells the interweaving saga of several generations of families tied together by the crimes and murders of the past…one of the big events in many of these characters’ pasts, which has been referenced since the very first Criminal story, was the death of Teeg Lawless. Before we even met Teeg, we knew that he had died when his son was a teenager, but other than the identity of his killer, we have never told the rest of that story. It’s just been a ghost haunting the series, as Teeg Lawless has become one of the most popular characters in the comic.”
Other characters featured across the Criminal comics series include pickpocket Tommy Patterson, his son and child prodigy Leo Patterson, Teeg’s brothers Tracy and Ricky Lawless, expert forger Jacob Kurtz, city kingpin Sebastian Hyde, and Jake ‘Gnarly’ Brown, manager of the Undertown bar, one of the few things all of the characters have in common.
Details on the Criminal comics Amazon adaptation are scarce as Amazon declines all invitations to comment. Still, it has been confirmed that Criminal writer Ed Brubaker has been brought onto the project as an executive producer and showrunner for the series. It’s currently believed that Nick Pepper, Amazon’s head of Subscription Video on Demand for TV, was responsible for bringing the series into development after he signed Brubaker into a 2019 deal with indie company Legendary Television, where Pepper is the President.
More information on the Amazon adaptation of the Criminal comic series by Ed Brubaker will become available as the series continues development.